Lenders

U.S. Treasury Secretary Scott Bessent has discussed ways to tighten the Treasury’s oversight of the Federal Reserve by borrowing elements from the Bank of England model, in a move that could significantly reshape the central bank’s relationship with the government.

It was a tiny Swiss bank, headquartered in an open-plan office close to Lake Zurich and little known abroad. But MBaer Merchant Bank AG would sometimes charge clients 10 times the normal rate to process payments.

Iran-linked hackers have stepped up cyberattacks on Israel in recent weeks, wiping data at more than 50 small businesses and compromising about 50 public security cameras, Bloomberg reported Tuesday, citing Israel’s top civilian cyber official.

Britain’s financial regulator has opened an investigation into collapsed mortgage lender Market Financial Solutions, marking the first formal regulatory probe into the Mayfair-based group after its failure amid fraud allegations.

The U.S. Treasury Department said on Friday it had imposed sanctions on an international network of 16 people and companies that allegedly diverted more than $100 million to Hezbollah since 2020. 

Switzerland has approved its first comprehensive national strategy for fighting money laundering and terrorist financing, the country’s Federal Council announced Friday. 

Career officials at the U.S. Treasury Department are pushing back against a Trump administration effort that could require banks to verify customers’ citizenship information, as lenders warn the idea would be costly, difficult to implement, and potentially harmful to the economy.

U.S. regulators on Thursday proposed easing bank capital rules, a move that would allow the country’s largest lenders to hold billions of dollars less in capital and mark a major win for the sector.

ING plans to cut about 1,250 jobs worldwide this year under a cost-saving program that will rely more heavily on artificial intelligence, with many of the reductions expected in anti-money-laundering operations.

The United States on Wednesday issued a general license broadly authorizing U.S. companies to do business with Venezuela’s state-run oil company PDVSA, a move that could unlock new investment and eventually increase the country’s crude production capacity.